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Knitting For Charity: Hailey's Hope Foundation

Submitted by Aaronknits on Tue, 2009-09-01 21:09

I received this email from a very dear friend that I've known since kindergarten. I wanted to share it with you good folks here in hopes that we might be able to help. The Hailey's Hope Foundation provides assistance and support to parents of premature babies. You can read more about them at their website (listed in the email).

"Hi All,

I hope this e-mail finds you well. My cousins have begun an amazing organization called Hailey's Hope. If you can give or participate in the fundraiser that would be wonderful. If not, I understand - absolutely no pressure. Thank you so much for taking the time to look at the information that I attached. I tried to copy it below but I think the spacing is off. The link to the organization is: http://www.haileyshopefoundation.org Currently they are implementing a Financial Assistance Program at the hospital. Their next endeavor is requesting donations from "baby" companies to put together discharge bags. So right now they are pricing bags, pacifiers, bottles, formula, nursing supplies, thermometers, weight conversion charts, diapers and lots of other stuff. They are finding out that most of the big companies like Babies R Us only donate to the big charities like Make a Wish, March of Dimes, or United Way so they are not getting a lot of stuff donated.

Thank you again!

All the Best,
Christine, Greg, Kate and Charlotte"

My own nephew, who is now a healthy 20 year old, weighed a whopping 3.5 lbs at birth, spent the first two months of his life in the hospital and still had to wear a heart monitor for a couple months after that. I remember how hard it was on my poor sister making almost daily trips to Syracuse (a 3 hour drive from where we lived) just to be with him while he was still in the hospital, and nervousness and worry we all felt each time that heart monitor sounded it's alarm. So, when I got this email, it really hit close to home and wanted to help in any way I could.

Hopefully this is where you all come in. Since the big companies aren't willing to donate much, I was hoping we could, in the form of hats, booties, blankets, anything to keep these precious little angels warm and cozy when they come home from the hospital. There's quite a few patterns for preemies at www.knittingpatterncentral.com (just type in "preemie" in the search box) or if you've got a favorite pattern for baby things, that's cool too.

If you'd like to contribute (and I hope you all do!) please send me an email or PM and I can provide you with my address to send your items. I know many of us have other projects we're in the middle of, and others planned, but most baby items are generally small and require little time (and yarn), but your generosity and love that you put into your donation will be appreciated forever.

I think having your contributions in the mail to me by October 31st should be a sufficient "deadline". I will then send the items on to the Hailey's Hope Foundation on behalf of all of the MWK community. Of course, the foundation will most likely have an ongoing need for donations of all kinds, so if anyone wants to continue making items whenever you have time and yarn, the donations will always be welcome.

Thanks so much for your time and for being such wonderful, caring, and generous community!

I have done one... Eric talked me into trying one and it was fun. The only bad thing was that when I was clipping the thread at the end when I was down to my last button, I clipped a yarn in the body. It's in a bag, I am now going to have to have a go at knit repair. It was fun, I plan on doing another soon. This time I will find my scissors instead of using the nail clippers that screwed up my first one :)